This is a site devoted to casting a spotlight on those comics in the Sunday pages that for one reason or another, were never collected.
Also, I'll be paying attention to other comics worthy of wider recognition.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Old-School Ipod

Everyone knows about those iconic Ipod advertisements, where there would be people dancing to the music in Silhouette, right? I found a Sunday comic that might've subconsciously influenced this - from 1987, when such things were called Walkmans.

The vacuum cord even acts like the headphone cords for the Ipod as well. I didn't think about this until I noticed. Being deaf, I don't have any real interest in music. I might sound like one of those old fogies, but to me, ALL music is noise to me. (Which, technically, is the definition of music, only it's synchronized noise) Interestingly enough, I have a hobby of collecting Fansubbed Anime theme songs, since I prefer these verbose lyrics to the official versions. In some cases, I prefered the theme songs to the shows themselves. Seeing the words onscreen and eventually figuring out the rhythm is rather challenging, especially since most of the words don't rhyme. They're more like poems than anything.

Seeing the lyrics in accordance with the Animation makes me wonder if that's how people who watched MTV enjoyed music videos in the same way. As I mentioned before, I convert words to pictures, and pictures to sound, so it's a very unique visceral experience for me.

When I started to like the catchyness of a theme song (either the opening or closing), I used to try to copy as many of the words I could in the darkness of the Anime clubroom with a pen & paper handy. Oftentimes, I wouldn't succeed the first time around, and had to wait two weeks for the next meeting to catch the next installment. Not to mention some lines would go by so fast I'd have to make mental notes to keep my eyes on the middle of the screen. Also, since I was writing in the dark, I left whole sections left blank, and tried to fill those lines in the second time around, and got some lines mixed up.

Thankfully, Youtube helped relieve me of some of this madness. Especially since I was a perfectionist, and wanted to make sure I had the commas, periods and ellipsis right. Sadly enough, Japan got fidgety enough about the Youtube posts, and had the majority of them removed, further negating another generation from enjoying them. Next to not getting a copy of the Italian Calvin animation, I regret not getting a copy of these when I had the chance.

(Half) - 2nd OpeningI put my ear to your back and hold you.My body bothers me like a border line...I feel so uneasy that you might disapear...My feelings drive me nuts if I hold them inside.I always want to be close to you. Never further than 10 feet from me.Let’s take turn pulling rose petals.Passing over bowing sun flowers.Riding on the wind... so I can fly...First time I felt your temperatureI wanna be much stronger than anyone!With warm rhythm.Two hearts beat as one...Lip and lip. Eye and eye. Hand and hand...God doesn’t forbid anything at all.I love you, I love you, I love you.I’m not tired yet, but an adult wouldn’t get it.It’s so painful, distressing...I wanna show my feelings, it’s almost exploring.I’m waiting for you, pretending I’m not waiting.That’s why... Touch my cheek with your trembling hands in your front pockets.Cast spell over my loving heart. Like, not to let the sun go down.

In these two cases of Ruronin Kenshin, I only have the memory of the accompanying images that showed alongside the lyrics, and it disapoints me that no one else will know about these. I live in the hope that someday, I'll be able to find somebody who still has the ShinSenGumi fansub of the Kyoto arc, since it was so well done.